Maybe you want to have a look at this article for EXPLAIN PLANS and EXECUTION PLANS. Keep in mind, that things like bind peeking won't happen if you generate an EXPLAIN_PLAN! http://www.usn-it.de/index.php/2009/02/26/oracle-explain-or-execution-plans-guess-or-reality/ Best regards -- Mit freundlichem Gruß Martin Klier Senior Oracle Database Administrator ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Klug GmbH integrierte Systeme Lindenweg 13, D-92552 Teunz Tel.: +49 9671/9216-245 Fax.: +49 9671/9216-112 mailto: martin.klier@xxxxxxxxxx www.klug-is.de ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Geschäftsführer: Johann Klug, Roman Sorgenfrei Sitz der Gesellschaft: Teunz, USt-ID-Nr. DE175481608, HRB Nr. 2037, Amtsgericht Amberg oracle-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx schrieb am 20.11.2009 17:13:59: > Von: > > Yong Huang <yong321@xxxxxxxxx> > > An: > > oracle-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx > > Datum: > > 20.11.2009 17:16 > > Betreff: > > Re: explain plan and the real execution plan > > Gesendet von: > > oracle-l-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx > > In addition, if the queries against this table recently started to > use columns not used before, the content of col_usage$ will change > thus affecting the stats related to auto generated historgram. > > Yong Huang > > Tanel Poder wrote: > > > 1) The optimizer statistics > > > > I assume this database has no change – no ddl and dml. Under this > > situation, I would say the optimizer statistics would remain the same, > > correct? > > Even if you have no DDL and no DML happening, someone may still have > gathered optimizer statistics on the tables and changed them. Maybe the last > > > > -- > //www.freelists.org/webpage/oracle-l > > >